Facebook sex fiend jailed for four years

A WOMAN posed as a teenager to trap a sex fiend who had been stalking young girls across Townsville on Facebook.

Brett Smallwood contacted five girls, all aged 14 and 15, asking for sex and in some cases offering money.

Townsville District Court was told yesterday that Smallwood’s obsession with contacting teen girls was so bad that not even bail conditions banning him from internet use could stop him.

He bombarded one 15-year-old with more than 261 Facebook and phone messages in less than three weeks.

An adult friend of another girl, aged 14, texted Smallwood posing as a teenager and agreed to meet him at IGA Mount Louisa to confront him.

Smallwood, 42, ran off after the woman started giving him a piece of her mind.

He pleaded guilty yesterday to 16 charges, including six charges of using electronic communications to procure a child for sex. Six other charges were for bail breaches.

Judge Clive Wall QC jailed Smallwood for a total of four years, with parole eligibility on August 6, 2015.

“Your contact with these girls has occurred with frightening regularity and frequency, over a relatively short period of time,” he said.

“People who use the internet, Facebook and mobile phones and the like to make contact with young people with the view to sexually exploit them, as you did, must be on notice that such behaviour is likely to result in … generous terms of imprisonment.”

Prosecutor Kelly Stone told the court Smallwood asked the 14-year-old if he could have sex with her. When she said she was 14, he offered her $500.

Mr Stone said the parents of one 15-year-old pleaded with Smallwood via SMS to stop contacting their daughter.

He agreed, but still sent another text to the girl telling her if she wanted to talk she could.

In most cases, Smallwood accessed the girls’ phone numbers from Facebook pages.

Barrister Michael Hibble said that, until this spate of ­offending between September 2013 and April 2014, he had had no criminal record.

“I tried to find out what triggered this explosion as he has never offended before in his entire life,” he said. “That is until suddenly last year, when he starts to trawl the internet.”

Mr Hibble said his client, who has cerebral palsy, did not have many friends.